8
Vinson threw down his pencil. "Theory holds," he said ruefully. "But unless we can prove it we are beaten. And how can we prove it when nothing but pencil-and-paper proof is available?"
"You are still postulating a new means of communication?" asked Narina.
Vinson waved one of the metal cubes taken from some machine—somewhere. "This is it," he said.
Narina shrugged and looked at the big calculator in the laboratory. "That has none," she said.
"True," he agreed. "But remember that the machine may have required some artificial means before it was joined into the master thinking machine."
Narina nodded glumly. "Cube of metal or none," she said, "it gives the wrong answers. Now—"
Narina's next observation was never made. A roar came from outside—far in the distance but none the less a roar of voices in fear, in determination, in wonder. Then the roar of voices was mingled with the whistling roar of jet-propelled aircraft that screamed over the top of the laboratory building and circled. Ignoring the bare-handed men on guard, these aircraft landed and disgorged a myriad of small machines.
And from the water of the bay there appeared a similar horde, but these were huge and lumbered forward on tractor treads, shedding water as they came.